


some things, not impossible

by skycatcher



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Minor Character Death, Time Travel Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-11
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:40:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24091498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skycatcher/pseuds/skycatcher
Summary: There are far too many people on Tatooine.Or: Vader hates sand, Cody is trying to get the job done, Rex is the voice of reason and Ahsoka drew the short straw. Qui-Gon just wants to fix his hyperdrive.
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi, CT-7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano, Qui-Gon Jinn & Obi-Wan Kenobi
Comments: 24
Kudos: 457





	some things, not impossible

The red lightsaber was a dead giveaway, reflected Qui-Gon, as he slid into battle calm. The ship was nowhere in sight, and as much as he would have liked a quick exfil, he was glad there would be no collateral.

Against all odds, Sith. Master Yoda would not be pleased.

Lightsaber in hand, Qui-Gon shifted his foot forward, settling into what he liked to call a ‘defensive’ stance. It wasn’t — defensive at least — the Sith leapt towards him, galvanised by the cautious pose, and Qui-Gon struck.

Focus, thought Qui-Gon, even as their sabers clashed in a hiss of smoke. The Sith was strong. He parried Qui-Gon’s swipe at his knee, double-bladed weapon slicing through the air towards his shoulder. Qui-Gon blocked, ducked, and spun, and the Sith stumbled past him. No time for celebration; the left blade-end stabbed backwards in a blind but precise movement. Qui-Gon deflected it in a one-handed block his Master would have approved of, and followed up with an overhead sweep.

The Sith matched him for power as he came up to stop his head parting from his shoulders. There was a momentary struggle, and they slid away from each other, only to drive their boots back into the sand and leap —

They were thrown apart by a whirlwind of sand and hot desert air. Qui-Gon staggered back, bemused, eyes closed against the flying grains, willing down an imaginative feeling of dread. Another player in the game? He would not be able to face two Force users alone, much less one who could call up such a storm. And yet. There was a wildness to it that spoke of energy flowing as nature intended. Qui-Gon’s neck prickled. He stretched his senses and tensed; there was someone at his back.

It was not the Sith.

“Captain,” said a familiar voice, distorted by the wind. “Please stay behind me.”

A moment — and Qui-Gon was thrown to the ground. A Force push. He heard more bodies hit the unforgiving sand and a split second later, laser bolts where they had been standing.

“What is this?” demanded a deep, hollow voice, made impersonal with a respirator’s harsh cadence, muffled slightly by distance.

“It appears this is Tatooine, sir,” said a second voice, flat, accompanied by the sounds of deft hands reloading a blaster pack. His words must not have been welcome; there was the sound of a gauntleted backhand to the face. Qui-Gon thinned his lips.

“Silence.” Anger hit him, an uncontrolled fury that did not belong to him, and Qui-Gon struggled to breathe. “ _Kenobi._ ”

One of the other men stood up.

“Hello there,” he said. Kenobi. “I don’t believe we’ve —”

What must have been a regularly witty remark died on his lips. “We’ve…”

The wind fell, and Qui-Gon saw the respirator voice belonged to a monstrously tall man, gloved in black and metal, helmet unreadable and all-encompassing. Behind him stood a gaunt man in military greys and a striking scar down his face, offset now by a bloody lip; he seemed unfazed, was holding a blaster rifle, and looked like he knew how to use it.

Opposite them, unmistakeably Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Qui-Gon’s mouth wanted to drop open in shock, but the threat of the sand scouring the air, and long years of training, stayed his jaw.

“Anakin?” said Obi-Wan. He wasn’t looking at Qui-Gon. He was too old. His stance was poised, ready for battle, as comfortable as his favourite nook in the Archives and as familiar as the hilt of his lightsaber. Or, thought Qui-Gon uneasily, perhaps more. He didn’t recognise that lightsaber.

The man in black ignited his. It was red.

“What did you do to Anakin?” said Obi-Wan, his unfamiliar lightsaber now in hand, and oh that was anger; it was cold and worried and furious.

“He’s dead,” said the Sith, with a strange joy. Another Sith. It was Qui-Gon’s lucky day. “End your pathetic trickery now, Kenobi.”

“I didn’t do this,” said Obi-Wan. And, “You’re lying.”

“End it,” screamed the Sith, and the intensity of his hatred hit them like a duracrete wall. That was when his original Sith tumbled out from behind a rocky outcrop and launched himself at Qui-Gon.

Or tried. Three sharp blaster bolts cut the air, so close they sounded like one. Two from the soldier near-buried in the sand behind Obi-Wan, full-face helmet hiding his expression and protecting his vision. His grip was steady, both blasters aimed true, but the Sith deflected them.

Not so ready for the other soldier. Smoke trickled from the rifle of the man behind the tall figure, and the hooded Sith fell to the ground face-first. He didn’t move.

Obi-Wan toed the body over. The red and black facial markings stood stark underneath the glaring sunlight.

“General,” said Obi-Wan’s soldier, from where he was still half-lying on the ground. “With all due respect, this is a giant clusterfuck.”

“I…” Obi-Wan looked like he was struggling to finish a jigsaw with missing pieces, and Qui-Gon wanted to warn him. Pay attention to the Sith! “Qui-Gon, get behind me.”

That, however, had no trace of uncertainty. Qui-Gon cautiously edged behind Obi-Wan.

“Don’t trouble yourself with the riffraff, my Lord,” the Sith’s officer was saying.

“Rex,” said Obi-Wan, warningly, but Obi-Wan’s soldier pulled himself to his feet and said loudly, “Don’t get in my way, brother.”

In profile, the officer’s face was sallow and sharp. “I don’t have brothers, traitor.”

Rex said, “What the —”

“I know,” said Obi-Wan, urgently, quieter. “I know. I know, I know.”

Rex tried again. “He’s your —”

“I know,” said Obi-Wan. “Something’s wrong.” He left Rex in the sand with Qui-Gon and stalked closer to the Sith, and suddenly he was a blur, blue clashing with red in a sizzle of plasma. Once, twice, and Obi-Wan executed a neat riposte and flipped away. He was so close to Qui-Gon and Rex, Qui-Gon could hear him breathing.

A master knows their opponent from the moment their blades cross.

“Anakin,” called Obi-Wan, and there was no more of the frigid anger. He deactivated his lightsaber. “I’m sorry.”

“Fool,” hissed the Sith, stepping closer.

“So it is you,” said Obi-Wan. There was a wealth of expression in his voice Qui-Gon could not comprehend. “I’ve failed you.”

Qui-Gon could feel Rex backing away, dragging him with him. “But —”

“This way, General,” said Rex, quietly, mouth set in a firm line.

“I chose this,” said the Sith Lord. “You would take even that from me?”

Obi-Wan paused. There was a reluctance to it. “You certainly spent years proving I couldn’t stop you.”

“How observant,” drawled the Sith. “Now, die. You have held me back for the last time.”

Just as Obi-Wan slashed at the red saber with his own, Rex dived, bodily tackling the Sith’s officer to the ground. “Cody, you fucking idiot,” he said, drawing back an armoured fist.

Cody beat him to it. A hook to the chin dislodged Rex’s helmet, precision compensating for poor leverage. Their faces were very similar. Brothers by blood then, thought Qui-Gon, although Cody had years on Rex. Rex’s punch only clipped Cody on the side of the jaw, and left him open for a twist and flip. They grappled, and Qui-Gon could only watch for a time to intervene.

Cody fought like a man who had never had anything given to him; every scrap of dignity and professionalism, every jab and punch, was something he had claimed for his own through blood and blaster fire. Rex fought like he expected to lose. There was no room for overconfidence in the tight lines around his eyes and the grim set of his shoulders. It was Cody’s lack of armour that did him in, although not for his lack of trying. Rex planted a foot on his back and drew a bloody hand across his mouth in a brief moment of respite.

“Get off me,” snarled Cody. “I have orders to terminate General Kenobi.”

“What?” said Rex, chest heaving with exertion, too winded to sound anything but incredulous. He leaned more of his weight onto Cody’s shoulder joint and Cody opened his mouth in a silent howl.

“Traitors, all of them,” gasped Cody, grin made all the more ominous by blood trickling from his split lip. “He killed _her_ , and I killed Kenobi.”

Rex’s instant of disbelief was his undoing. Cody swept Rex’s legs out from under him and made a grab for one of his holstered weapons. Qui-Gon chose that moment to pull Rex towards him and push Cody away, and bore the full weight of the equal and opposite force of Rex flying into him. They went sprawling into the sand. Was there such a thing as knowing someone too well? Rex had known Cody was telling the truth. An unfathomable truth. After all, Obi-Wan was standing right —

There, duelling a Sith Lord, who had caught Cody by the throat, suspended in the Force. Qui-Gon’s eyes widened. It was grotesque. The Force could be bent to one's will, but means was not an end. Rex had already rolled off him and into a crouch, frustration and fear bleeding off him. Obi-Wan slid into a side stance, lightsaber angled to cover his torso, shoulders steady and even, projecting nothing. It was effortless; a level of mastery Qui-Gon could not recollect. “Let him go,” Obi-Wan said.

The Sith Lord said nothing. Cody continued to choke, hands strangely limp, no sign of a struggle. Qui-Gon closed his eyes. He could feel the threads of the Force, strong and furious, twisted firmly around Cody’s dimming presence, ready to snap his neck.

“I loved you, Anakin,” said Obi-Wan, a statement of fact, and the Sith gave an inarticulate cry of rage; Obi-Wan lunged for the respirator tubing just as Qui-Gon wrenched, and untwisted all the Force around him, and Cody fell to the ground. Rex cried out, and Qui-Gon started for the still body.

The Sith staggered back, hit with the backlash of Qui-Gon’s artless Force manipulation and Obi-Wan’s lightsaber slashed through the respirator with a depressurised hiss. “Oh, no,” groaned a new voice. A young Human man, tufty ponytail mimicking his frantic head movements a moment delayed as he looked left and right. Qui-Gon frowned. How did he get here?

He didn’t have time to think because a tall, muscular form grabbed the Sith’s stricken form and threw him through a portal the young man had pulled into existence with his bare hands.

Qui-Gon blinked.The portal was gone.

“That was too close,” said the taller of the two, a Togruta woman. “I hope you got the right one.”

“It was,” said the boy, confident, just shy of cocky.

“Even so,” she said, and looked down into Qui-Gon’s eyes. “Master,” she said politely. Qui-Gon inclined his head, focusing on Cody's damaged throat under his hands, and was rewarded with a rattling gasp of air.

“Ahsoka?” said Obi-Wan. He was wide-eyed and breathing quickly, and despite the suns’ glare his face was pale.

“No time,” said Ahsoka, all business as she knelt next to Qui-Gon, and if she brushed something out of her eyes, Qui-Gon could assume it was sand. She cradled Cody’s head in her lap and said, “Your hands, Masters.”

Obi-Wan knelt across from them, and stripped the gauntlet from his hand, resting his bare palm on top of Qui-Gon’s. It was clammy and shaking. Obi-Wan took a breath. His hand was still unsteady; Ahsoka enfolded it in both of hers, and placed it on Cody’s brow. It felt natural to close his eyes as Ahsoka did. The Force had something to tell them. Qui-Gon could feel Ahsoka guiding them through the maze and the mist, to the source.

“Oh,” said Obi-Wan, in wonderment and horror.

Cody screamed, pained and guttural.

They opened their eyes.

Cody twitched, breathing heavily; there was blood trailing out of his right ear. Qui-Gon watched it discolour with grit and sand. There was a thing in his head, and it was not giving up without a fight.

“Cody,” breathed Obi-Wan. “Stay with me.” He was flagging. He was injured, or nursing old injuries, and in what seemed like a crippling state of shock, but pushing past it physically had cost him some of the pinpoint concentration required for a deep meditative trance. Qui-Gon breathed out, and let go of all his reservations and fears of these strange familiar people, and kept only his connection to the Living Force and his unwavering belief in Obi-Wan’s dumb stubborn pigheadedness.

That, at least, he knew well.

Ahsoka’s brows shot skyward. Obi-Wan made a small, choked noise.

“The Force is here for you,” said Qui-Gon, steadily, the bedrock only he could be, and he could feel Obi-Wan drag his weary, unwilling self to his centre and settle. He could feel the weight of the desert, the caress of the suns, Ahsoka’s coiled presence, Rex, the young man. Cody. The tension radiating from Obi-Wan lessened.

“It’s had a long time now,” said Ahsoka. “Careful, Obi-Wan.”

“Always,” Obi-Wan said, like a whisper, or perhaps he had thought it; Qui-Gon couldn’t tell. He felt the moment Obi-Wan found the catch, and it was like they had re-entered atmosphere without stabilisers. His ears popped. Cody went limp. Obi-Wan’s undisguised sharp intake of breath was let out, a soft second later, the Force pulsing with life more surely than the faint heartbeat Qui-Gon could feel on the edges of his mind and bones.

Obi-Wan shifted his weight from his knees to his toes and stumbled backwards, hands shaking free of Ahsoka’s grip and massaging at his temples. “Fuck,” he said. He looked exhausted. It was a pervasive weariness that chilled Qui-Gon with a disquieting dread that had no name. He started for Obi-Wan.

“It’s the Sith,” said Ahsoka, tiredly, answering a question unvoiced, and Qui-Gon turned. Cody opened his eyes.

“Hey, brother,” said Rex, sinking into the sand beside him and shadowing his face from the suns. “Nap time’s over.”

Cody sucked in a breath. It looked like it hurt. “Rex?” His voice cracked.

“Hey,” said Rex again.

“I’m finally dead,” said Cody, in some awe. “Thank the Force.”

“No, you idiot,” said Rex. “You think death feels like your brain went two rounds with a gundark?”

“Did you just call me a gundark?” said Obi-Wan, but his tone fell flat.

Cody stilled. He was facing the wrong direction, he said, “It can’t be.”

It was Ahsoka, still knelt by him, that said, “It is.”

Cody said, “Dreams are something the Empire can take.”

“I know,” said Ahsoka fiercely. “But they didn’t take this.”

“Ahsoka Tano,” said Cody, and there was something lost and wistful, even as he said her name slowly, with precious care. He coughed wetly and struggled to rise. “You think I can believe that?”

Ahsoka ungently held him down, and said something, quietly beside his ear, and Cody stopped moving.

“We came for you,” said Ahsoka, voice cracking. “It took us so long, but the rebels are here for you.”

“It’s too late,” said Cody. “I’ve done so much. Too much. Not enough.”

“That is not for you to judge,” said Ahsoka, and despite the stern words, a gentle smile twitched at the corner of her mouth. Yet Cody shrank back. Ahsoka coaxed him upright, and Rex wedged an arm under Cody’s.

“Where are you taking him?” demanded Rex.

“Back to our time,” said Ahsoka. “There’s someone waiting for him.”

Rex narrowed his eyes. “Commander.”

“I don’t know where,” she said. “Ezra does.”

“C’mon, Commander,” said the young man, but he was speaking to Rex’s brother. Ezra’s bright eyes were lined with an old grief. Qui-Gon thought, with finality, _War_ , in a way he hadn’t before. Ezra closed his eyes and spread his hands and there was an opening in the fabric of the landscape to…

The exact same landscape.

“What are you trying to pull, kid?” growled Rex.

Ahsoka laughed, and couldn’t stop laughing, and then she was curled around her knees and crying. Qui-Gon understood that sentiment, a bit. He reached down to comfort her, but she didn’t move. Obi-Wan had turned, towards the portal, an unreadable expression flitting across his still demeanour. His eyes passed over Cody’s blood-streaked face, and something caught him there.

“Don’t,” said Cody. Rex helped him to his feet. To Ezra, he said, “Through here?”

“Right in one,” said Ezra. “Say hello for me, won’t you?”

“Yeah, sure,” said Cody. “As soon as I —”

Obi-Wan was in front of him. Cody snapped his mouth shut. Obi-Wan’s fingers gently wiped the blood and dirt from the side of Cody’s face. “Thank you, Cody,” he said gravely. And then, “Try not to hit him too hard.”

“Only because you asked so nicely,” said Cody. “Goodbye, General.”

“Out in the sands,” said Obi-Wan, “It’s just Obi-Wan.”

Cody tilted his head and quirked his lips as he stepped through the portal and disappeared.

Ezra collapsed to his knees, and so did Obi-Wan.

“Obi-Wan!” Qui-Gon reached out with a sudden hesitation. Obi-Wan gazed up at him, even as Qui-Gon bodily lifted him back to his feet. He was lighter than he looked.

“Master Qui-Gon,” he said. “Surely I’m dead.”

“We’ve been through this,” said Rex reasonably, supporting half of Ezra’s weight. “Up you get.”

“Thank you, Rex,” said Ahsoka. “We need to get you two back.”

“You’ve been dead for a long time,” said Obi-Wan. Qui-Gon opened his mouth, to say —

“It’s all right,” said Obi-Wan, quietly. “You need to get back to the ship. Your Padawan is waiting for you.”

“What happened, Obi-Wan?” It came out hoarse.

“You died on Naboo, fighting the Sith apprentice Cody shot,” said Obi-Wan contemplatively, inspecting his lightsaber before refastening it to his belt. “I took Anakin as my Padawan the day after.” He looked up, not meeting Qui-Gon’s eyes. “Apparently, that’s not going well.”

Rex snorted, and said under his breath, “Skywalker needs a kick up the ass,” as Qui-Gon attempted to sort the ramifications of Obi-Wan’s words.

“I need some time to think,” said Obi-Wan. “I need…”

“You need to go back,” said Ahsoka, again, and she was right; there was an unnatural tension to the Force, even as she looked at him and Rex like she wanted to shield them from all the harm the universe could inflict.

“Ahsoka,” said Obi-Wan.

“Master Obi-Wan,” she said, and pulled him into a tight hug.

“Look at you,” whispered Obi-Wan. “I’m so proud.”

“Rex and I will come,” said Ahsoka. “Once we’ve taken down the Empire. I promise.”

Obi-Wan cracked a small smile. “Now you know where I am?”

That seemed to remind Ahsoka — “I need to do you, too,” she told Rex, and gently placed her fingertips on his temples. It took her a moment, and then she drew back. The Force breathed out around her, like it had let something go. “It’s done,” she said. “Chancellor Palpatine is the Sith Lord.”

Obi-Wan just said, “That was fast. You did your Rex’s, already, before?”

Ahsoka lowered her chin in affirmation. “They all have one. It’s a form of mind control.”

“Ah,” said Obi-Wan, vaguely, and Rex’s swearing took on renewed vigour.

Qui-Gon tilted his head.The name was familiar; the position not. “Senator Palpatine?”

“Not for much longer,” said Obi-Wan, with vitriolic distaste. “This explains far too much.”

“And so it does,” said Ahsoka. “Obi-Wan. Secrets killed the Jedi Order.”

Those were strong words, thought Qui-Gon. Obi-Wan stared at her. Ahsoka stared back. She was taller than him.

“I see,” said Obi-Wan. “I am so sorry, Ahsoka.”

“The burden is not all yours,” said Ahsoka, wry. “Although there is one of you who would try to bear it. Not this time, Obi-Wan. Not for you. You hear me?” She pressed her forehead to his, gently, the ridge of her montrals brushing his skin.

It was too intimate for Jedi. It was a Mandalorian gesture. Qui-Gon felt a strange dissonance, like he wasn’t standing in the middle of an Outer Rim desert. Instead, his boots were slipping in the cold, dry mountains surrounding Sundari, rocks worn to silt by the harsh winds, the Captain of the Guard pressing their forehead to his and asking to _keep her safe_. Then the Guard had left and it had fallen to him and Obi-Wan.

They had kept her safe.

“I do,” said Obi-Wan. Then, “If you would be so kind as to — ?”

Ezra planted his fingers in the air, and opened out a world that was as dusty as Tatooine. Qui-Gon took a breath. Clay, not silica.

“Ryloth,” he said. Obi-Wan’s gaze slid to him. Obi-Wan spoke Ryl. He’d learnt it for the humanitarian mission they’d taken after — “Obi-Wan,” and there seemed to be a great many things to say, and Obi-Wan knew it; a forehead to his, brief, like he knew Qui-Gon had thought of the Duchess’s guards going home to die by the hands of their people, for their people.

Obi-Wan didn’t say _keep them safe_ , like he knew there were some things that were not guaranteed. He said, “Teach them well, Master Qui-Gon,” so very gently, and was gone, through the hole in the world.

Rex nodded at him. “General.” To Ahsoka, “I’ve got your back, Commander.”

“I know,” said Ahsoka, calm, and held out his helmet. Rex looked at her, and carefully lifted it from her grasp. He fastened it with a surehanded action of having been done a thousand times, and stepped through without looking back.

It was quiet. Only footprints and blood in the sand spoke of their meeting. Soon, the desert wind would erase all traces.

“This is where we part, Master,” said Ahsoka, with a little smile, like it wasn’t like they should have never met in the first place.

“You are Anakin’s Padawan,” said Qui-Gon. The thought had come to him, and it had stayed.

She said, “A long time ago.”

Qui-Gon did not know if he was allowed, but it felt settled. “Then we will meet again.”

Ahsoka looked at him, and it was with both careful calculation and a deep longing. “We will,” she agreed. “Give the Council hell for me.”

Qui-Gon arched a brow at her, and she laughed, even as she turned towards Ezra. “Go,” she said to Qui-Gon, flapping her hands. “Go and save our people.”


End file.
